Guns and Roses
by Kagmi-Cron
Summary: After the Joker's disappearance, new monsters continue to emerge from Gotham's underworld. Filling the power vacuum is a brutal drug ring with a familiar calling card and a dangerous new weapon. Can Gotham's protectors fight crime and resist temptation?
1. Chapter 1

**Foreword:** For those who don't know, this story is a sequel to our previous story "City of Sorrows," a Joker-centric fic also featuring the Riddler. If you have not read "City of Sorrows," we highly recommend visiting our stories and checking it out. A direct sequel to _The Dark Knight_, it was written mainly to further explore the Joker and the themes of _Dark Knight_. We have attempted to write "Guns and Roses" so that it can be enjoyed without having read "City of Sorrows," but we think you will enjoy it much _more_ if you have the backstory.

"Guns and Roses" is expected to be a Jonathan Crane/Scarecrow-centric fic, also featuring an incarnation of Poison Ivy. Commissioner Gordon, Bruce Wayne, Harley Quinn, and Whisper are also expected to be key characters whom we hope to continue to develop to their fullest potential. The Joker will not be making an appearance in this story, although we have not ended his plotline completely.

* * *

**Guns and Roses, Chapter 1**

Police Commissioner Jim Gordon stood several meters away from the yellow police tape barrier, his back turned to the murder scene within. Inside the cordoned-off hotel room lay six bodies; the bodies of police officers, his men until their demise a few short hours ago. But that in itself was not why he was standing outside the scene with his eyes closed, fighting off nausea. The victims had not been killed in a standoff or in the process of busting a drug deal; they had been lured here to die.

And we sent them in.

A set of brisk footsteps approached him. "You okay, Commish?"

Gordon opened his eyes. "Fine, Rita. I'll be fine. As always."

The detective nodded, looking weary. "Good. Bard's here. He wants to talk." She gestured towards a sleek black car, and Gordon cursed inwardly. The District Attorney was here? What was he thinking?

I guess that's one job you have to be crazy to even take on in this city.

The Commissioner sighed, mopping his brow and trying to compose himself as he approached the car. The back door opened ahead of him and he slid in to find himself sitting across from the redheaded DA.

Bard didn't mince words. "I heard it's bad."

Gordon winced. Is it ever anything else? "Six cops," he agreed, taking a deep breath. "It was a setup. The cartel's actively targeting cops now, not just firing in self-defense. They want to scare us off, to keep us off of their turf."

The DA looked pensive for a long moment, staring out the car's window at the run-down buildings beyond. "Correct me if I'm wrong," he said slowly, at last, "but hasn't Shark Avenue always been neutral territory? When I was working the criminal circuit, we had the hardest time prosecuting Shark Avenue cases; all the gangs and cartels operated right on top of each other, so anything that happened here was almost impossible to trace back to any one group. No one seemed to want to claim it as territory, because they could all use it as a dumping ground for their particularly nasty revenge killings."

Gordon nodded. "You're right. This is new. Shark Alley's neutrality was part of an agreement between the crime bosses; we almost had their meeting place staked out before the Mob Murderer blew it sky high."

Bard paused. "So you think this is part of the aftermath?"

"The bombing took out virtually everything we knew about the underworld leadership. Almost all of the kingpins were there, along with half of their assistants. Frankly, we have no idea who has moved into power since then. Whoever the new bosses are, they're operating through proxies and keeping their identities very well-guarded chest."

"Understandable."

Gordon hesitated, debating whether to raise the next point. The evidence was so fresh, so tenuous...

"Detective Cophenhagen does have one theory."

Bard's eyebrows shot up. "Fire away."

Commissioner Gordon closed his eyes, attempting to shut out the memories of what he'd seen at the crime scene. "The victims--the police officers we sent in--were dressed like Scarecrows. Apparently after they were killed. The costumes resembles what Jonathan Crane was arrested in. Noose around the neck, burlap sack over the head--along with some other creative touches. Crane's still on the loose since the ferry incident; my detectives think he could be involved."

The DA stared. "Crane? I used to work with that guy--he hardly struck me as the assertive leadership type."

Gordon nodded quickly. "I agree. I think the motif is a copycat job, meant to be frighten and mislead. Anyone who worked with Crane during his Scarecrow phase could have replicated his outfit."

Bard sighed, leaning forward with a frown. "This is bad, isn't it?"

"I'll put it this way; we're taking all our undercover agents off the streets until further notice."

"What about responses to distress calls?"

Gordon winced. "We haven't figured out what to do about that yet. Pray, I guess."

Bard looked from side to side, fidgeting impatiently. "And the Batman?"

"Still hasn't been seen," Gordon supplied. "But I'm sure he has a good reason."

Bard looked far from satisfied with that answer.

Gordon was saved by a rapping on his window. The driver rolled it down to reveal the face of detective Copenhagen. "Commissioner," she said, "we need your signature on some things. And Forensics wants to talk about the fingerprinting."

"I'll let you go, Commissioner." Bard waved a hand in resignation. "But I expect to be updated. If we have a war zone brewing, I want to know about it before the tabloids do."

Gordon couldn't help but grin inwardly. As if such a thing is possible. But he shook his head seriously. "I'll do my best."

* * *

It was twilight deep within the city; that grayish time as day transitioned into night. On Shark Avenue, twilight brings anxiety for any law-abiding citizens still unfortunate enough to be trapped there; for Shark Avenue's outlaws and vigilantes, it brings an adrenaline rush.

Whisper Lieng couldn't decide which one she was, as she watched the shadows deepen outside her storefront. She was tending to her plants, performing the nightly ritual of closing her herbal medicine shop. The shop was quite unlicensed, of course, born from an abandoned space that she and Harley had fixed up themselves--but unlicensed vendors were the last of the cops' concerns around these parts. The many distractions also made it the perfect place to keep a couple of fugitives hidden.

It was a dangerous place to live, of course, but Whisper had more reason to be confident in this area than appearances would suggest. She masqueraded as an immigrant woman, helpless and harmless and not proficient in English; someone inconspicuous enough to be of little interest to either the police or the drug rings.

Of course, that was only by day. Upstairs, Harley was patching up tears in their costumes. With Harley as a red-and-black jester, Whisper covered head to toe in green fabric leaves, and an underlayer of kevlar to protect them both, the two were considerably more formidable than their daytime identities suggested. At first, thievery had been a necessity; having barely escaped from the Joker and the Riddler with their lives, they had no material goods to their names and no money anywhere accessible. Harley could not even use her own legal identity without risking prosecution or a mandatory "witness protection program" for her role in the Joker's escape and disappearance. So, getting dressed up to conceal their identities, they stole what they needed to make a fresh start.

Of course it was only a matter of time before their nighttime activities became more than subsistence filching. As the weeks passed after the Riddler's incarceration for coordinating the Mob Murders, the scum of Shark Alley and elsewhere began to resurface, figuring that the lethal vigilante wasn't coming back.

Whisper smiled slightly to herself at that thought.

Whisper knew that chapter of her life was over. Edward Nigma's doctrine of merciless justice for the greater good rang hollow in her ears. He had attempted to kill Harley, a true innocent, based on the same principle. But Shark Avenue was a bad part of Gotham, and it was impossible to walk outside at night without encountering some sort of crime being committed (admittedly often to other criminals). It started with her foiling of a mugging she and Harley encountered on the way back from a theft; soon, however, she and Harley had made an agreement. She was teaching Harley the martial arts, and they now prowled the streets on a regular basis, looking for drug deals, robberies, and violent crimes to interrupt.

It was probably an unhealthy habit, but hell, it was addictive. Besides, they each sort of owed a debt to society.

Peering out at the now-dark street, Whisper sighed and turned the sign on the shop door to "closed." Though the outlaw in her was still very much alive, she had grown very fond of this shop, this semi-normal life she had with Harley. She was fully aware that this was the first real normalcy she'd ever had. Though she'd been well taken-care of under Nigma, living with him had held none of the sense of warmth and contentment she experienced here. Looking back at his attitude towards her, she wondered if she had ever even had a real relationship with another person before Harley, much less a loving one.

And the shop--well she was proud of this little place. The plants from which she derived her herbal remedies were stolen, true, but it was she who mixed them into medicines and sold them. And she suspected, somehow, that her plants were far happier here than they'd been with their previous owners. Somehow, it was hard for Whisper to picture what she'd done as really stealing. How exactly could plants be property, any more than people could? They should be with whoever would take care of them best.

Drawing the blinds in preparation for the plants' evening watering, Whisper froze. There were footsteps outside, and voices. And they were coming her way.

She relaxed out of the defensive position she'd automatically taken and composed herself. The chances of anyone actually wanting to rob a struggling herb shop were slim. The chances that they'd find much money in the place, Whisper thought ruefully, were even slimmer. It wasn't worth protecting the place to blow her cover as a harmless immigrant woman, unless Harley or the plants were endangered. She adjusted her posture to be one of timid anxiety and began shuffling back and forth.

There came a pounding on the door, so forceful she was afraid it would break. Jittering with practiced nervousness, she scrambled to unlock it and open it a crack.

It didn't stay cracked open for long. As soon as the knob turned the door was flung open, and three muscular men muscled their way into the dimly lit shop. Now Whisper was becoming genuinely somewhat nervous, but mostly angry. These men were invading her shop, and they looked as though they might damage the wares!

Keep calm. Don't give yourself away. The last thing you need to do is give yourself away.

She prayed that Harley wouldn't hear the commotion downstairs and come running.

"May I--help, you gentlemen?" she squeaked with an exaggeratedly thick accent as she bustled to head them off before they reached the next room.

"You the owner? Is your husband here?" The speaker was a man whose shirt barely contained his muscles, apparently the leader of the group. He eyed her skeptically.

She backed up, feigning fear of him, her eyes wide. "No...husband." She gestured towards herself. "Only me." Then, the epitome of naiveté, she added shyly: "Store closed."

Something about that disarmed the thug. He actually laughed, his posture relaxing visibly. "Just you, little lady? Well listen here; we got an offer to make you."

Enjoying her act and the effect it was having, Whisper backed up further. She picked up a vase, not yet occupied by any plant, and held it threateningly.

That made the man laugh more. "No, no, not like that, little lady. The big man sent us." He looked at her expectantly, as though she should know what that meant. Whisper genuinely didn't know, but something thrilled within her as she shook her head in confusion. The big man? For weeks, Harley had been interrogating any drug dealer they caught, trying to find ringleader. They'd had no luck so far.

The thug shook his head and rolled his eyes. "We got an offer for you," he repeated, and pulled something out of his pocket. "You sell this. See?" He shook a baggy filled with sparkling, blue-tinged crystals before her eyes.

Whisper felt slightly sick. They wanted to use her shop as a drug front.

The only way out of this was to feign ignorance. "What this?" she frowned like a critical haggler and took the baggy from him, shaking it in front of her own face to examine its contents.

"It's Blue Diamonds, lady," the man explained. He pantomimed injecting himself in the arm. "You know, good stuff?"

Whisper managed to suppress the urge to laugh at that description. She pursed her lips and shook her head. "No good. Not medicine."

The man moved towards her. "Come on, little lady. Try it, you'll like it."

She backed away from him, standoffish, and decided to pre-empt him before he could force her to sample the stuff. She opened the bag and sniffed a little; the smell was sharp and slightly metallic. She faked a violent sneeze that sent half the powder flying, then dropped the other half on the ground, staggering backwards and gagging violently.

Her visitors didn't look too happy about that. She wondered how much the stuff in the bag was worth.

"Come on now!" the leader of the trio advanced towards her as the other two scrambled to try to collect the remnants off the floorboards. "You gonna sell this. You gonna sell it, or pay us not to make you."

Backed up against the window now, Whisper was running out of options. They clearly weren't going to leave in peace.

So, as the large man advanced towards her, Whisper snapped her leg up and delivered a swift kick to the side of his head. In the confusion that followed as his cohorts tried to figure out how a five-foot-five Asian woman had felled their boss, she managed to knock his head against a shelving unit and use his own momentum as he tried to lunge toward her to hurl him out the window. She winced at the crash as the glass broke.

That's not going to be easy to repair.

Another one of the thugs was coming at her now, though the third held back, apparently afraid. The second attacker wielded a potted plant apparently intending to smash her in the head with it, but she seized the arm that held it and twisted. The man now thrown off-balance, it didn't take much to swing him through the window after her partner.

The last gangster stood, almost comical in his panic, seeming equally terrified of facing her or of running away in front of his pals without even trying to. Staying in character Whisper scrunched her face into a stern glare and pointed towards the door as though lecturing a child. "You. Go. Leave."

He complied, scampering past her and proceeding to pick up his bloodied coworkers on the curbside. Whisper stayed where she was, hunched and glaring, until the two men disappeared from sight.

Then she leaned her head back and sighed. A cold draft was blowing in through the window, and she knew there was nothing she could do about that tonight. Filing a police report on an unlicensed shop when the two owners happened to be fugitives was out of the question; and she suspected the thugs would be back tomorrow, with friends. Probably lots of friends, after the treatment she'd given the three of them.

There was a skittering sound in the back room. Still in fight mode, Whisper whirled, adrenaline surging through her--then laughed aloud as Harley trotted out, clad from head to toe in her Harlequin costume and dragging a her sledgehammer.

Harley opened her mouth to speak, then took in the broken window and Whisper's combat stance as she stood in front of it. "I heard--what--are you alright?!" The third question won out, and Harley dropped the sledgehammer with a crash, rushing forward to embrace Whisper.

Only as she relaxed against Harley did Whisper realize she had actually been shaking. "Harley," she gasped, letting out a small laugh, "I'm an assassin, remember? I'm fine."

"But you're not in costume," Harley protested in concern, stepping back to examine Whisper for any cuts or bruises. It occurred to Whisper suddenly that, lacking the Kevlar protection of her suit, she may very well have been injured if those men had brought out arms on her. Her stomach dropped and she surged to embrace Harley again, giving her a quick kiss. "I'm glad you changed before coming down," she murmured. "You're no black belt yet."

Harley pulled back, grinning awkwardly. "I know. You are, though."

Both of them reassured by that, they turned to face the broken window.

"You know," Harley reflected, "I probably shouldn't be standing in front of this in my suit."

Whisper shook her head. "It doesn't matter. We've gotta get out of here."

Harley looked alarmed. "What?"

"I'll explain later. Start packing."

* * *

**Feedback** is appreciated! We haven't written in a while, so let us know how we're doing.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2**

* * *

Bruce Wayne's entire body hurt. He opened his eyes slowly, wincing as the light invaded them. This, he decided, was worse than being hungover.

Frustrated with the weakness of his own body, he started to sit up.

"Oh no you don't," an older gentleman's voice echoed from somewhere in the distance. "You're not going anywhere for at least another twenty-four hours." Alfred emerged from the next room, carrying a tray.

Bruce groaned and blinked. "What if I have to go to the bathroom?"

"In that event, I'm following you."

Bruce had to grin at the older man's determination. He couldn't say he blamed Alfred for worrying; God knew he was stubborn when it came to Batman, but even Bruce wasn't crazy enough to try to fight crime in his current condition.

Thoughts of reality intruding, he rolled over in bed and pressed a pillow over his head. Batman had been off the streets for two weeks now. He tried not to imagine how many violent crimes had been committed in that time, how many people had died who needn't have...

"Learn your lesson?" Alfred displayed his usual uncanny ability to read Bruce's mind.

"Fine," Bruce muttered. He had to admit Alfred had earned this I-told-you-so moment. He had neglected, time and time again, his caretaker's admonishment to slow down the pace of his vigilantism and give his body the chance to recover. The compulsion to protect the city was too strong; by the time he caved and took Alfred's advice, it was involuntary. He'd been running a fever of 104 and was mildly delerious.

"An ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure," Alfred had chided him.

Okay, Bruce conceded. One night off a week won't kill me. Even through his pounding headache, he grinned at the irony of the thought. One night off a week might very well lower the chances of him dying.

He heard Alfred sit down in the chair next to his bed. From the sound of his posture, he knew Bruce wasn't sleeping, and he wanted to have a talk.

"As long as you're a captive audience," Alfred began, "we have another problem."

Oddly, hearing that perked Bruce up. Problems were something to do, something that could be solved--not like this infernal illness he was powerless to fight off. Tentatively, he rolled part of the way back towards Alfred.

To his infinite surprise, Alfred picked a brightly-colored tabloid up off the tray. The comedic of the old Englishman reading The Globe was quickly dampened when Bruce saw the cover. It was a montage of decidedly unflattering photos of him, caught dozing or daydreaming during his daily activities. Physical and mental exhaustion was evident in all of the pictures--he guessed that the photos had been tampered with to enhance the effect, but they were disturbing to look at nonetheless.

The cover title read "BILLIONAIRE'S DESCENT INTO ADDICTION."

Bruce groaned and slapped the pillow back over his face. He muttered something, but it was unintelligibly muffled.

"I agree," Alfred said, dropping the magazine with disdain. "Still, I suppose the supposition was bound to arise eventually, all things considered."

Bruce removed the pillow from his face. "Can we ignore it?"

"It would not be wise. Mr. Fox has done his best to keep the board in line, but they are itching to buy out your shareholdings."

Bruce actually straightened at this. The thought of actually losing his stake in Wayne Enterprises had never occurred to him. Him, without the resources he needed for Batman--and all those resources, in the hands of profit-seekers instead of under his control...

"Mr. Fox has had some ideas on how to remedy the situation."

Bruce relaxed. That was a relief; he certainly didn't have any, in his current state. He laid back and folded his hands behind his head. "What do we do?"

"First, we publicly announce that you've been recieving treatment for mononucleosis. The public was not previously informed because you did not consider your medical history to be anyone's business, but you are outraged by the accusations of drug use. Second, you sign a legally binding contract to get at least one night's uninterrupted sleep per week, on pain of losing your shareholding."

Bruce's eyebrows went up. He laughed. "Legally binding? With who?"

"With Mr. Fox."

Alfred is serious about this, Bruce realized.

"Okay," he resigned himself, making a mental note to argue about it later. "Is that it?"

"The third step..." Alfred's eyes narrowed intently, as though he were consulting some internal notepad where he and Fox had the whole plan written out. "Is a program of philanthropic public appearances. As soon as you recover--to our satisfaction," Alfred added, "you begin charming high society again, the board included. There's a charity banquet for Gotham Unviersity next week. They're raising funds to research a new and very deadly virus discovered in Africa. A generous donation to the cause would look very, very good."

Bruce nodded slowly. "I like the way Fox thinks. I--uh--when's the banquet?"

Alfred stood up, taking the tabloid but leaving a tray of food and medicine behind. "That," he declared, "is none of your concern right now, Master Bruce. You are not leaving this bed until I say so."

At the moment, that didn't seem so horrible a fate. Bruce rolled over and curled up, feeling suddenly like a teenage boy again. How long had it been since he had just relaxed like this, lying in bed late for hours with nothing to do? How long had it been since he'd allowed himself to be human?

There was a very good reason he hadn't, but he pushed that thought as far as he possibly could from his mind. He wouldn't be surprised if Alfred had a tranquilizer gun readied for any possible escape attempts...

Then, quite abruptly, Bruce was filled with an inexpressible gratitude for his butler and for Lucius Fox. Without the both of them, there would be no Batman.

Without both of them, he would be dead.

And so it was with an odd, euphoric sense of childlike euphoria, Gotham's caped crusader sank into a deep slumber.

* * *

It was after midnight when an old blue car pulled up to the corner of Fifth Avenue and disgorged a fairly ordinary-looking fellow. He looked anything but rich, and anything but fashionable; tweed suit and cloth coat, with a fedora perched awkwardly on his head. He walked with his head down, eyes focused on the pavement with a mild expression on his face.

Since Fear Night and his escape from police custody, Jonathan Crane had gotten better at keeping his head down. Much better. It simply didn't pay to have the appearance of power; the ones who appeared to be in charge were the first to fall.

And so he whistled off-key as he trudged down one of Gotham's classier avenues, towards a gated estate on the edge of the University campus.

He smiled harmlessly at the gate guard, who smiled back. He thought Crane was an intellectual friend of the professor's by the name of Jim Cole, an eccentric oddball without very much money. The professor had told Crane he'd be expected tonight.

Jason Woodrue was in the plush study, at the end of the hallway atop the marble staircase. Crane felt an odd mixture of loathing and fascination every time he took this route; the lavish expenditure of resources on something so useless maddened him, but at the same time there was something intriguing about this lifestyle. He'd never been rich and he suspected he'd grow bored of it quickly, but just for a few days, to have the experience...

He rapped on the door of Woodrue's study, knowing it was unwise to sneak up the man. "Come in," the pleasant-sounding voice came.

He pushed open the door. Within was a lavishly decorated room, red carpeting and mahogany contrasted by the bizarre modern art sculptures that adorned the mantel. Jason Woodrue was a thin man with graying hair, dressed as casually as Crane was. He leaned forward, good natured, and poured two glasses of brandy.

Crane smiled thinly and sat in the chair across from Woodrue's desk. Without a word he produced a bag that contained a dozen ounces worth of cloudy, blue-tinged crystals. He watched the other man's eyes fixate on the crystals as he slid them across the desk.

"Enough?" He asked, dryly.

Woodrue licked his lips, then pursed them. "It'll do. It'll do for this week. But I'm planning to expand my customer base; it'll have to be more next time."

Crane raised his eyebrows playfully. "More? My, professor, but you strain our production capabilities."

"The hell I do," Woodrue laughed. "You've got a bloody factory down there. If anyone's capabilities are being strained it's mine. Would you believe it's actually harder to filch chemicals as a professor than as a student?"

Crane smiled back, appreciating the joke. It was true, he knew from his own time at the university--the professors were watched like hawks, the students assumed harmless.

"Well my men could procure the chemicals," he offered, "if you'd kindly provide us with--"

"No!" Woodrue barked, then laughed. "No. How stupid do you think I am, Crane? For half the profit, you'd have me offed in a week if you had my half of the formula."

Crane smiled, relaxed, took a generous swig of brandy. "Right, right," he murmured. "You don't let your guard down for a minute, do you professor?"

Woodrue smiled back at him, but he was clearly still on his guard. "To profit?" he queried, raising his glass.

"To profit!" Crane toasted him, and continued to watch the other man closely as he drank.

Woodrue came away from the glass smiling. "You'll thank me after next week, Crane. I've got my sites set on Gotham's biggest addict. Or at least the one with the biggest pocketbook."

Crane made an inquisitive noise in mid-gulp, wiping his mouth with one hand.

"You read the papers, don't you? Then you've seen how Tom Wayne's precious little boy has has been tasting much more than wine?"

"You don't have any proof that he's ours," Crane retorted. "If Bruce Wayne were an addict, believe me, I'd know about it."

Woodrue shook his head, gesturing enthusiastically. "Look at the writing on the wall! The man's not sleeping and he's barely eating, and whatever he's spending his energy on it's not business. I doubt even his Italian supermodel friends could keep him that busy."

Crane sat back, considering this. There was a chance. Not a safe chance, but perhaps, just perhaps that wouldn't matter... "If you're wrong there'll be hell to pay," he warned Woodrue. "Everyone and their grandmother would crucify the man who Bruce Wayne turned in as a drug pusher. It'd be professional suicide."

Woodrue was confident. "I'm not wrong. What reason do we have to believe Wayne's not an addict? He's never done anything useful in his life except function as a figurehead for the board of Wayne Enterprises, he seems to have the discipline of a common housefly, and I can't really think of anything he does do except seek new absurd and expensive thrills. Not that I know the man personally, but his public activities don't exactly suggest a man of great moral fiber."

Crane settled back in his chair, smiling at the prospect. "If you get me Wayne, I'll be indebted to you."

"Don't worry," Woodrue murmured, gathering up the baggies of rocks and shutting them neatly in his desk drawer. "This stuff is the best. There's nothing like it anywhere in the world. Even if he's a first-timer he'll be hooked. And I have a plan to deliver it to him before anything appears...suspicious."

Crane raised an eyebrow, but Woodrue did not explain further.

"So," Woodrue inquired. "Where's the money?"

Crane shook his head, smiling slightly. "Next week," he promised. "I had an instinct about tonight. Apparently it was right. If we pay you and you get caught trying to hook Wayne, no one benefits. You get your half after that little rendezvous."

Woodrue snorted and glanced up at Crane. "I don't buy it."

"After Wayne," Crane assured Woodrue, and he meant it. "If you get me Wayne, you've earned it."

Woodrue nodded, but his eyes were narrow. Crane pursed his lips, knowing there was no way to assuage the man's suspicions at the delayed payment.

"Just remember, Crane: I'm your supplier."

Crane nodded graciously, stood and bowed. "Of course, professor. My enterprise could not function without you."

* * *

Some controversial plot choices here, obviously...we'd love feedback, especially on our characterizations!


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